Snapchat, the innovative instant photo-sharing app, has announced new feature "Chat", which lets users to start text conversation simply by swiping right on a friend’s name in the Snapchat inbox. The new feature allows live video sharing – and face-to-face chat for users who are both online, while notifying you when a friend is active in your Chat so that you can give each other your full attention.

According to the company blog post, Snapchat was missing an important part of conversation: presence, knowing you have the full attention of your friend while you’re chatting.

Hence, the introduction of "Chat" to notify users when a friend is online, allowing them to start live video chats with the press of a button. While, messages viewed by both you and your friend will be cleared – either of you can always tap or screenshot to save anything you’d like to keep.

The new service will be launching with Android and iOS, and is seen by analysts as most requested features by Snapchat users. Albeit, the new features are commonly offered by its competitors, these are the must-have features in order for Snapchat to retain its users, and also to acquire new ones.

Snapchat introduces video and instant messaging for iOS and Android

Snapchat, the innovative instant photo-sharing app, has announced new feature "Chat", which lets users to start text conversation simply by swiping right on a friend’s name in the Snapchat inbox. The new feature allows live video sharing – and face-to-face chat for users who are both online, while notifying you when a friend is active in your Chat so that you can give each other your full attention.

According to the company blog post, Snapchat was missing an important part of conversation: presence, knowing you have the full attention of your friend while you’re chatting.

Hence, the introduction of "Chat" to notify users when a friend is online, allowing them to start live video chats with the press of a button. While, messages viewed by both you and your friend will be cleared – either of you can always tap or screenshot to save anything you’d like to keep.

The new service will be launching with Android and iOS, and is seen by analysts as most requested features by Snapchat users. Albeit, the new features are commonly offered by its competitors, these are the must-have features in order for Snapchat to retain its users, and also to acquire new ones.